Rhapsody for the Theatre: A Short Philosophical Treatise, first published in French in 1990, occupies a unique spot in Alain Badiou's oeuvre. Part theory and part theatre, or at least prototheatre, it certainly can be read alongside other books from the same period, especially Handbook of Inaesthetics and Metapolitics, devoted respectively to the truth procedures of art and politics that function as two of the four conditions of philosophy according to Badiou. Of the other two conditions, mathematics is treated in Number and Numbers and Briefings on Existence: A Short Treatise on Transitory Ontology, whereas love is the only truth procedure not to receive a book-length investigation. Even in the case of Badiou's treatment of love, a text such as “The Scene of the Two” resonates with the present text due to the importance given to the production of a “scene” for the amorous couple. In addition to opening up a fascinating dialogue with this theoretical treatment of the four conditions of philosophy, Rhapsody for the Theatre also and at the same time can serve as the ideal accompanying piece for Badiou's work as a playwright, most notably the Ahmed tetralogy that comprises Ahmed le subtil, Ahmed philosophe, Ahmed se fâche, and Les Citrouilles and that was staged in a quick creative sequence starting just four years after Rhapsody for the Theatre was published. In fact, one of the most intriguing aspects of this treatise is the way in which it moves between philosophy and theatre to the point of opening up a space of indiscernibility between the two.

It is as good a division of the world as any other to observe that there are and have been societies with theatre and others without theatre. And that in societies that know this strange public place, where fiction is consumed as a repeatable event, this has always met with reticence, anathema, major or minor excommunications, as well as enthusiasm. More specifically, next to the spiritual suspicion that befalls theatre, there is always the vigilant concern of the State, to the point where all theatre has been one of the affairs of the State and remains so to this day!

This article reflects my current research, exploring the complex interactions between the discursive practices of theatre and performance on the one hand and philosophy on the other. Instead of beginning by trying to formulate the general principles for such an interaction, I examine actual encounters: direct face-to-face meetings and actual dialogues between philosophers and representatives of the Thespian professions. The earliest recorded encounter of this kind is in Plato's Symposium depicting the banquet in Agathon's house, celebrating his victory at the Lenaean theatre festival in 416 b.c., during which the celebrants spent the whole night eulogizing Eros. On this occasion Socrates and the two playwrights, Agathon and Aristophanes, interacted directly on several occasions.

In The Power of Darkness (Vlast' t'my; 1886), Tolstoy examines the nature of human evil in the unlikely context of the Russian peasantry, a class with a privileged relation to the Good throughout most of his oeuvre. Tolstoy's first major play chronicles Nikita's rise as a philandering laborer who succeeds to the fortune of his peasant employer (Pyotr) through a murder that is conceived by his mother (Matryona) and carried out by his employer's wife (Anisya). After marrying Anisya, Nikita descends into drunkenness, seduces his sixteen-year-old stepdaughter, Akulina, and fathers her child. Many commentators—taking their cue from the play's subtitle, “If the claw is caught, the bird is lost” (kogotok uviaz, vsei ptichke propast’)—have followed the logic of Tolstoy's plot in search of an original sin, usually locating it somewhere in the confrontation between a backward peasantry and the forces of progress, especially money—a bane of civilization that corrupts the play's characters from without. This same logical sequence can be reversed so as to foreground not the causes of evil but its victims. Nikita's final and greatest crime is the killing of Akulina's newborn. Here Tolstoy's oft-disparaged moralism proves no less groundbreaking than his play's cutting-edge naturalism. Through an artistic strategy of moral provocation, The Power of Darkness contributes to a modern revaluation of evil through the figure of the murdered child, a tradition that runs from Swift to Dostoevsky to the photojournalism of twentieth-century warfare.

Imagine an E♭+5 chord opening this meditation, played on a late-1940s Gibson hollow-body ES-125 electric guitar, the instrument held high on a woman's chest so she can play and narrate at the same time. Not just what I need to tell, not just what I need to sing, but how I need to tell, how the lyrics will make this collection of notes into an essay. Close your eyes. Wouldn't you rather listen to this discourse on the field? Walking with your earphones, washing the dishes with an ear cocked for the important bits, lying on the floor after hours at the computer—you could just listen.…

How did he do that? This question has been on the lips of audience members since magicians first began delighting and amazing viewers with skills of dexterity and legerdemain. The first-known recorded, secular magic performance dates back to 2500 b.c. when the conjuror Dedi presented a series of tricks for the Egyptian king Cheops at the royal palace. The event was recorded in the Westcar papyrus, a document that was composed around 1700 b.c. but is thought by Egyptologists to have been copied from earlier sources. Yes, magic and conjuring have long been an integral part of popular entertainment, and from these very early beginnings, secular magicians have continued to provide entertainment for audiences of all ages right up through the present day. Magic shows are still some of the hottest tickets of the Las Vegas strip, and touring artists such as David Copperfield can still fill theatres. Magic is also popular on television once again thanks to the work of David Blaine and Criss Angel. Organizations such as the International Brotherhood of Magicians (IBM) and the Society of American Magicians (SAM) also boast a strong membership.

For someone who reads most of the time—on the train, in the library, at the dentist's—this is not an easy question to answer. Reading occurs at various levels of concentration; for me, focus is determined by the environment as much as the book. And what I'm reading now or in the past few years is not psychologically defining, I suspect, any more than what happens to be on my iPod is: both are subject to randomness, convenience, and passing attraction. Roland Barthes said he divided his reading in two branches: for work he read at the desk; for pleasure, on the bed. That's a bit too dichotomized as it leaves out the armchair and the waiting room, and I usually fall asleep while reading on the bed, but the basic idea is fair enough. A different place for different reading.